Primal Journal (ShannonCC)

Today is 3 weeks of eating primal so I guess I'm actually sticking with this

I started at 235 and am now around 225 (last I weighed - I don't weigh every day). I'm 5'5" and female. I have no memories of ever being slim but I do have a few pictures from when I was very young (5 or 7) when I wasn't yet fat. Most of the women in my family are fat and we all have digestive issues that I thought were related to gluten. I went gluten free a few years ago and felt better, but not great. After a few years, I went back to eating it. Now that I've cut all grains, I feel great, so it wasn't just gluten, it was grains in general.

I've spent the last year and a half eating a low fat, low sodium, almost vegan (meat and cheese were very rare) diet. After three weeks of eating primal, I still feel almost giddy when I cook bacon or some other delicious, fatty meat

Exercise is pretty limited. I have quite happily given up the chronic cardio (that I could never stick to anyway). I'm vaguely following Mark's recommendations for exercise.

I walk almost every day. We live in a very walkable town and my kids and I walk to the library and the grocery store often.

Three days a week I have started body weight strength moves. I do knee pushups, squats and, as of today, assisted pullups (one foot on a chair - following one of the daily apple videos on youtube). The workout takes about 30 minutes and that includes a lot of resting between sets.

I try to sprint at least once a week. Running a block on the way to the library or challenging my 12 year old to a race to the car from a playground. Stuff like that.

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Primal Blueprint Explorer My blog for people who are not into the Grok thing. Since starting the blog, I have moved close to being Archevore instead of Primal. But Mark's Daily Apple is still the best source of information about living an ancestral lifestyle.

Thanks! I'm staggering the workouts and giving myself at least a day in between so I should be good.

Today we hosted a children's birthday party. I had no problem making cupcakes and icing and not eating any. A good, hearty breakfast of bacon and eggs and an orange helped! But still, it was pretty unlike me. Cool!

Sunday is another birthday party here. When I started I told myself I'd have cake at the party (the whole 80/20 thing) but I just feel so good lately, a piece of cake isn't worth the crash and crappy feeling after. I'll have something yummy and primal for a treat instead - like lamb steaks or something equally drool worthy

Before primal, tea with milk used to give me headaches. No sugar, just milk. After primal, I've been drinking tea with heavy cream and not getting headaches. I thought that meant the headaches were from the grains in my diets and just sparked by the tea and milk for some reason.

This morning I ran out of eggs so I took the one left and bulked it up with cheese and washed it down with my tea with cream. For the first time on primal, I got a headache after drinking the tea. I think it is dairy that's a problem but maybe it's not as big of a problem with no grains in my diet?

Either way, I've decided I'm going to cut back on the dairy. No more heavy cream except for special occasions. It's yummy for a treat but I've been drinking it in tea every day (yummmmmmm) and have been thinking for awhile now that it probably shouldn't be an every day thing for me. I'm also thinking no more daily cheese. I don't eat it every day actually but still, I could probably cut back a bit.

The only thing staying for sure is butter to cook my eggs in and put on veggies. If I can find ghee I'll try that but til then, grass fed butter will be the only dairy in my daily diet.

I sort of want to do a full 30 thing, but the idea of scrambled eggs cooked without butter is just too sad to contemplate

I had carb cravings for the first time yesterday. I was in a store with my son and saw a package of cookies and thought how gooooooooooooood they would be. I didn't buy them, but it was literally the first time in weeks I craved something like that.

Turned out it was PMS, lol! It was the tiniest of blips so not a big deal but I guess I'll be on the lookout every month.

I stopped working out half way (ok, a quarter way) through because I just felt tired. Maybe also another thing I'll look out for once a month.

Yesterday was a birthday party here. I carried the cake to the front room and it smelled good but I wasn't tempted to have any. I made a cold cut platter and mostly ate roast beef smeared with sour cream which was incredibly delicious.

When I first started eating this way I thought I'd eat cake and sweets on special occasions. I'm not saying I never will, but the thing is, I feel so much healthier since cutting grains and sugar. I knew what would happen if I ate that cake. I'd get that nasty sugar crash and would have ended up lying on the couch afterward, feeling tired and cranky instead of having fun with my family. I mean really, if I want to have sugar for a special occasion, I should probably eat it at bedtime and then just crash all the way to sleep, lol!